


Early Mornings, Late Nights

by SmolAndDangerous



Category: Henry Stickmin Series (Video Games)
Genre: Established Relationship, Exhaustion, Hurt/Comfort, Injury, M/M, Nightmares, Overworking, Scars, Stress
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-07
Updated: 2020-09-11
Packaged: 2021-03-06 21:14:53
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 1,438
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26335507
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SmolAndDangerous/pseuds/SmolAndDangerous
Summary: It was almost routine for Reginald to jolt awake at 3 a.m. anymore.
Relationships: Reginald Copperbottom/Right Hand Man
Comments: 7
Kudos: 190





	1. Early Mornings

**Author's Note:**

> This took way too long for me to finish, given how short it is :(. Hope yall like copperright?

It was almost routine for Reginald to jolt awake at 3 a.m. anymore. He’d always been a light sleeper, which he used to hate. Lying still as a statue and tracing nonsensical patterns into dull gray sheets for hours on end because a slight creak in the airship woke him up got very old, very quickly. These days, however, he considered it a blessing. His right hand man never wakes up for anything, not even his own nightmares.

Reginald’s eyes peeled open, only to be met with pitch darkness. A sliver of moonlight broke through the curtains he’d drawn hours ago. With an internal groan, he silently waited for whatever minuscule sound that had awoken him to make itself known, but was instead met with a sharp intake of breath. Eyebrows furrowed, he turned to look at his lover, a question already forming on the tip of his tongue, but he quickly stopped. Right Hand Man was almost vibrating, completely curled in on himself. The covers were tossed violently to the side, sheets tangling together like cords. His back was turned to his lover, the strip of moonlight grazing a scar. With sinking eyes, Reginald slowly shifted closer. He knew better than to try to wake him; that resulted in aggressive panic and an accidental fist to Reginald’s chin (which Right profusely apologized for throughout the next day.) Instead, he laid just inches from him and softly rested a hand on his back. Right stilled slightly, but otherwise didn’t react.

Reginald gently traced the other’s spine with the back of his hand, slowing as his knuckles hit each raise in the skin. He’d gotten thinner since the fight, weaker from the months spent in recovery. In many ways, he was still healing. Reginald traced back upwards with an open palm, feeling each ridge and rough patch from the scars left behind. Right’s breathing had evened significantly, shaking reduced to sporadic bursts. Reginald swayed right, running along the line of his replaced arm. The ice-cold metal bit at the tips of his fingers, a harsh contrast against the warmth of Right’s skin. He hovered there for a bit, almost stunned, but continued on.

Reginald could recall each event and fight that left the canvas of scars. A bounty hunter’s stray bullet here. A serrated knife meant for Reginald there. There had been so many battles and injuries that Right just seemed to shrug off and walk away from, Reginald had practically forgotten his lover wasn’t invincible. Right seemed to have forgotten as well...

But this wasn’t the time for Reginald to enter a downward spiral of negativity. Right was here, he was fine, and that was what mattered. Reginald wrapped and arm around the other’s torso and pulled himself close, nuzzling his forehead into the skin just beneath the plate of metal on Right’s shoulder. Reginald noted that his lover’s pulse was normal under his hand, and let himself be drawn back into sleep by the rhythm of the other’s breathing, the strip of moonlight stretched across the two like a bond.

In the morning, Reginald awoke completely wrapped in Right’s embrace, his breath warm against his neck, humming some unknown tune in his ear.


	2. Late Nights

It was almost routine for Reginald to jolt awake at 3 a.m. anymore. He wouldn’t really call it “awake” given the lines between consciousness and unconsciousness seem to get blurred at this hour. The room was silent except for the ticking of the extravagant clock on the wall. His pen had rolled from his hand and found its way under the desk. He groaned as he leaned down to get it, muscles aching in protest from the awkward position he had fallen asleep in. Unfinished paperwork surrounds his desk in untidy mounds, collapsing over their own weight and scattering haphazardly across the desk and floor. An unapproved heist plan laid lonesome at the center of his desk, a small bit of drool causing one of the corners to curl up. He grimaced and wiped at it haphazardly with a tissue before reexamining it. He’d only gotten about halfway through his notes, commenting on a probable guard in one spot that hadn’t been recorded and a better escape route. He sighed, clicking his pen as he noticed yet another slip up that could get somebody killed. Really, he might need to set up a system where somebody pre-screens these-

The door slams open, leaving a sizeable hole in the plaster of the wall. Reginald shrieked, his back slammed up against the back of his chair as he grips the desk, nearly giving himself splinters. With the way the light was, he could only see the silhouette of the intruder, but instantly recognized him anyways. The ruby-red glow of that eye was hard to misplace.

“Christ, Right,” Reginald wheezes, “You scared-”

“Reg, it’s damn near three in the morning,” Right entered the light, approaching the desk with firm strides. “What the ‘ell are you still doing up?” He’s still wearing his field gear and his mustache is sopping wet from the downpour outside. He must have just come back from the scouting mission Reginald sent him on that morning. Yes, come back from his mission, went back to their room, and found their bed empty. At three in the morning.

Shit.

“I’m almost done,” Reginald quickly defends. The words run together, and even Reginald realizes how exhausted he sounds. Right peers at the turbulent piles, eyes narrowed. Reginald hides the shame of his obvious lie with the plan he had just been working on, adding a few more strokes of ink to it. The silence hung heavy in the air, and Reginald could just feel his lover’s eyes burning through the paper.

Suddenly, Reginald was a good few feet higher off the ground than he was before, his paper and pen tumbling down to the foot of his chair with a yelp. Reginald can feel the cold of Right’s cybernetic arm wrapped around him, and he huffs.

“I said I was almost done!”

“Sure ya were,” Right replied, triumphant smirk obvious in his voice. He makes his way out the door with Reginald over his shoulder.

“Right, I have too much work to do!”

“Reg, this is the fourth night in a row you’ve been up working so late. Yer’ gonna collapse. Whatever you have to do, you can do it in the morning. When you’ve rested.”  
Reginald opened his mouth to protest, but he knew it was hopeless. With the record he’s kept this week, there was no way Right was going to let him overwork himself again. That didn’t mean he had to like it, though. Grumpily, Reginald watched the familiar halls pass by as they went along.

“Oh, don’t pout,” Right laughs.’

“I am not pouting!” Reginald gasps at the audacity. Like he would be so childish!

“Mhm,” his chuckles are muffled in his throat. Knowing any sort of response would just prove his point, Reginald slumped against him, defeated.

Pride put to the wayside, Reginald could already feel himself fading. Numbly, he thumbs at the hair tie in Right’s hair until it comes undone, quickly burrowing his face into the orange locks. Even having been out in the elements all day, it still smelled of the hair gel Right used to keep it orderly. It still smells of cleanliness and familiarity and safety. Right gingerly plucks up one of Reginald’s hands and brings it to his lips.

They’re back in their room before Reginald even realizes it. Right kicks off his shoes at the door before heading over to the bed, gently sitting Reginald down at the end of it. He grabs Reginald’s hat off of his head and kisses his forehead, going off to the closet to put it away. On autopilot, Reginald unbuttons his shirt and tosses it somewhere, kicking his own shoes across the room. He tiredly fumbles with his belt and pants for a bit before managing to get both off into a crumpled pile. Deciding that was good enough, he crawls up to the head of the bed and curls up underneath the covers, eyes already falling shut. The bed shifts as Right joins him, sans hat and uniform himself. Reginald shuffles across the sheets before leeching onto the warmth of his lover, draped across his chest.

The last thing Reginald perceives in his state of consciousness is Right’s arms wrapping around him and three soft taps on his shoulder blade; Right’s signature way of saying “I love you.”

“Love you too,” Reginald mutters, lips twitching into a smile before he’s out like a light.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Is there a bunch of tense changes in this? Yep. Am I too tired to fix them? Absolutely.


End file.
